1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a bookbinding apparatus which carries out bookbinding by bonding a plurality of sheets, such as paper sheets, outputted from an image forming apparatus, with an adhesive, a control method therefor, an image forming apparatus, and a control method therefor.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, there have been provided bookbinding apparatuses which carry out bookbinding by applying an adhesive to a predetermined position of a plurality of sheets, such as paper sheets, on which images have been recorded by an image forming apparatus, such as a copier, a printer, or a multi-function machine.
Such bookbinding apparatuses include, for example: 1) a bookbinding apparatus that uses an adhesive discharge nozzle to discharge adhesive onto sheets; 2) a bookbinding apparatus that has a rotatable adhesive wheel mounted at an adhesive storage box such that an adhesive is attached to the periphery of the adhesive wheel and the periphery of the adhesive wheel is brought into contact with sheets to thereby bond the sheets together; 3) a bookbinding apparatus that discharges an adhesive formed of a mixture of a hot melt material (thermal adhesive) and hot compressed air through a nozzle; and 4) a bookbinding apparatus that applies a double-sided adhesive tape with an adhesive applied thereon in advance, to one side edge of a bundle of sheets, while heating the adhesive tape.
Moreover, other bookbinding apparatuses are known, including a bookbinding apparatus in which high pressure air is sprayed onto an adhesive that is discharged from an adhesive discharge nozzle to obtain a thin film of adhesive (for example, refer to Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. H07-080377), and a bookbinding apparatus in which sheets are sequentially conveyed in a first direction, are then turned to be conveyed in a second direction perpendicular to the first direction, then a line of adhesive is applied to an edge of the sheets, a plurality of the sheets are stacked and aligned, and pressure is applied to the sheets along the line of adhesive to thereby bind the sheets together (for example, refer to U.S. Pat. No. 4,473,425).
Further, other bookbinding apparatuses are known, including a bookbinding apparatus in which a tape with an adhesive, which becomes sticky when heated, applied thereon in advance is heated and pasted to an edge of a bundle of sheets, and a bookbinding apparatus in which a tape with an adhesive, which becomes sticky when it absorbs water, applied thereon in advance is pasted to an edge of a bundle of sheets (for examples, refer to Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. S62-284795, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,177,548 and 4,985,729).
Such bookbinding apparatuses have the advantage that, in comparison with bookbinding apparatuses which use staples, they can bind a greater number of sheets into one booklet and thus have high usability.
However, with the bookbinding apparatuses that use adhesive, since the adhesive is heated to a workable temperature, the heating of the adhesive generates an abnormal odor induced from volatile components of the adhesive. Thus, there was a problem that this causes discomfort to nearby operators.
Conventionally, such bookbinding apparatuses that use adhesive are mainly employed in systems, in which the bookbinding apparatuses are connected to large-type image forming apparatuses. Most such systems are placed in an isolated environment set especially for the system, and thus such a problem as stated above does not arise.
However, in recent years, there is increasing demand for systems in which such bookbinding apparatuses that use adhesive are connected to even small to medium size image forming apparatuses set in offices.
To accommodate the above-mentioned demand, measures have been taken such as to provide the bookbinding apparatus with a deodorizing filter to prevent leakage of volatile components of the adhesive to the surroundings.
Generally, there is a time limit to the efficacy of the deodorizing filter. Since the deodorizing ability is degraded by components of the substances that are adsorbed by the deodorizing filter, it is necessary to exchange the deodorizing filter before the deodorizing ability becomes degraded.
When the time to exchange the deodorizing filter is reached and exchange of the deodorizing filter is carried out while the adhesive is in heated state, volatile components of the adhesive which do not pass through the deodorizing filter will leak out of the bookbinding apparatus.
Operators performing the exchange of the deodorizing filter will also be exposed to volatile components of the adhesive.
Further, if bookbinding is carried out without exchanging the deodorizing filter even when the deodorizing filter has reached its exchange time, volatile components of the adhesive will leak out of the bookbinding apparatus.